Weekend Photoblogging

Japanese hops
Originally uploaded by urtica

I remember passing by this plant in Boston this past spring and just stopping and staring. The vine had pretty much taken over the raised bed it was in, except for the tree in the center. First time I have ever seen the invasive Japanese hops (Humulus japonicus), live and in person, and it was in the middle of one of the most pavement-locked parts of the city. Not sure how it got there, but the bed was cleared a few weeks later and the hops didn't come back (it's an annual plant).

Weekend Photoblogging

A gallery of strange and beautiful photos signifying death - images of ash trees attacked by the emerald ash borer (Agrilus planipennis):

We have borersign
Originally uploaded by Benimoto

Emerald Ash Borer Damage
Originally uploaded by a2gemma

Beauty in Death
Originally uploaded by John Hritz

Mark of the Emerald Ash Borer
Originally uploaded by RoguePoet

Ash Memorial III
Originally uploaded by Voxphoto

Ash Memorial IV
Originally uploaded by Voxphoto

(Thanks to Benimoto, a2gemma, John Hritz, RoguePoet, and Voxphoto for sharing these photos under a Creative Commons license.)

Real ID

Have you ever found a weird plant or animal in Hawaii and desperately wanted to know what it was? The Bishop Museum may be able to quench your thirst for knowledge with "Ask a Bishop Museum Scientist," a forum on the photo-sharing website Flickr. You can post photos or descriptions of insect pests or plants or animals that seem not to belong on the Hawaiian islands, and a real biologist will weigh in on the identification, along with information about whether the organisms are native or introduced and their history on the islands. While what gets posted seems to be a mix of native and non-native species, this is likely to be a valuable "Citizen Scientist" tool for spotting new potential invaders and tracking recent introductions. If you are not familiar with Flickr, a Yahoo! site that is free to join, the Bishop Museum provides instructions on how to participate here. And of course, this post would be remiss without mentioning some of the other great Flickr identification forums, all stocked with knowledgable folks: ID Please, What plant is that? and Bird Identification Help Group.

Tip of the virtual hat to KHNL8 TV for posting about this great resource.

2008 Calendars Are Here!

The Invasive Species Weblog 2008 Wall Calendar is now available for purchase at Cafepress:

The calendar features more than a dozen invasive plants and animals, each depicted in an 11 x 8.5 inch full-color photo. Among this year's selections are Black Swallow-wort, Mute Swan, and Yellow Starthistle. If you click through you can see a preview of all twelve months.

The ISW store is also chock full of many more gifts for your favorite weed geek. All (meager) earnings received go to charity or back to ISW readers as contest prizes.

Photo Synthesis

You can now access the full gallery of photos from my visit to Cutler Park, site of a release of Galerucella beetles as a biological control for purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria). There are lots of photos of beetles and other creatures on purple loosestrife and also many images of the native wetland flora in the park. All 61 photos are covered under a Creative Commons license, which means they are free to use for non-commercial purposes, provided I am credited as the photographer.

Stalking The Wild Itadori

Tomorrow I am lucky enough to be playing guide to Koichi Watanabe, a photographer from Japan, who has come to Massachusetts to see Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica, Polygonum cuspidatum, Reynoutria japonica, etc. etc.). Of course, Japanese knotweed is from Japan, so why come here? Koichi has been traveling all over the world to photograph this invasive plant in a variety of locations and habitats. I'll be taking him on the grand tour, including stops at UMass Boston (where the knotweed grows in pots! :-)), Franklin Park (where the Franklin Park Coalition will be our guides), and sites in Metrowest Massachusetts where giant knotweed (Fallopia sachalinensis) and hybrid knotweed (Fallopia x bohemica) grow. While Koichi is honing his craft, I'll be collecting photos for the Life on the Japanese Knotweed project. Hopefully, when we get back, I'll also have photos of some giant beasties munching on knotweed...stay tuned! (Hint)

If you'd like to see some of Koichi's work, check out his his website, which includes an explanation of his search for "itadori."

Reminder: ID flora and fauna using invasive plants tonight!

Just a reminder for you to stop by the Flickr groups Life on the Purple Loosetrife and Life on the Japanese Knotweed tonight from 5-7pm EDT (21:00-23:00 GMT) for a live poster session that will be broadcast at Cornell's Citizen Science Conference. The session officially starts at 6pm but we will be setting up around 5pm. We will be posting photos and hopefully getting some serious insect and plant identification done! In fact, over the past few days over a dozen new photos have been added, several of which could use some id. More details about the project are available in the original post.

Practice Random Sampling And Sensless Acts Of Volunteerism!

Are you an arthropod aficionado, or are you quick with the macro lens? If you're into nature and curious about how invasive plants play a part in it, consider joining the Life on the Japanese Knotweed or Life on the Purple Loosestrife project. I started those groups through the photo-sharing website Flickr as a way to collect data about the fauna and flora that use invasive plants. Now, this coming Wednesday (June 20th) from 6pm-7pm EDT, I will be presenting a live "poster" to demonstrate how these projects work, using my laptop and a wireless internet connection, at a poster session for a Citizen Science Conference at Cornell University.

Can you be around from 6-7pm EDT on June 20th to help id insects and other creatures that are posted to the group, to comment on and tag photos, or to contribute photos sometime that day? During the poster session the Flickr pages will be projected on a wall and I'll be refreshing frequently and letting the conference attendees explore the photo pages. I am even hoarding some images that I will be posting around 6pm to be sure there is proper fodder for id :-).

My goal for the live poster is twofold:

1. Demonstrate that a crew of Citizen Scientists can work together to investigate valid scientific questions (in this case, What species utilize Japanese knotweed and purple loosestrife? and How does data collected by widely dispersed volunteers compare to similar studies done by rigorous local sampling?)
2. Demonstrate that identification of flora and fauna can often be done simply and quickly if you get the right person to take a look (it really can, we do it on ID Please all the time!).

There is already a pretty amazing crew of amateur and professional naturalists at Flickr but the two groups could really use more members to help id and to contribute photos, especially people from countries other than the USA and where Japanese knotweed and purple loosestrife are native. If you want to participate but need a reminder email, just leave a comment here or send me an email.

Feel free to cross-post this if you are inclined to spread the word. (Citizens must be getting sick of all these requests for their help doing science!)

Weekend Shameless Self Promotion

For anyone interested in Life on the Purple Loosestrife, a citizen scientist project I started to photodocument insects and other organisms using purple loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria), I've posted a pdf version of a presentation I gave last week at the 4th Annual Massachusetts Water Resources Research Center Conference.

Since the LOTPL Project is all volunteer, all public, I felt it was only fair for any data I collect to be public as well. If you want more information, you can check out the Life on the Purple Loosestrife Flickr group, or even download the latest raw data in an Excel file.

Along with its sister project, Life on the Japanese Knotweed, this has turned out to be a very rewarding experience for me, and hopefully for some of the volunteers too :-). I am looking forward to collecting another season's worth of data this summer and hopefully recruiting some new volunteers as well!

You have been warned!

Weekend Photoblogging

You have been warned!
Photograph by Roger B.

This weekend's photoblogging entry comes not from me, but from fellow Flickrite RogerB. He lives in the U.K., where it is illegal to plant Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica) or to encourage its spread in the wild, as indicated by Schedule 9 of the The Wildlife & Countryside Act of 1981. Businesses like the one hanging these red tags provide knotweed removal services for landowners...for a price, of course.

Thanks to Roger B. for permission to post his excellent photo.

Knotweedy

Weekend Photoblogging

Knotweedy
Originally uploaded by urtica.

Japanese knotweed stems with fruits still intact, mid-January. Each fruit is a papery, winged achene containing a single seed. By the spring many of the achenes still attached to the plant will be empty, eaten by birds or more likely knocked away by the wind.

A lot of people are under the mistaken impression that Japanese knotweed doesn't spread by seed. While it has been quite successful at invading new sites via pieces of rhizome or stem, its seed is viable and is actually easy to germinate (don't try this at home folks :-)).

Now *that's* some Giant Knotweed

Weekend Photoblogging

Now *that's* some Giant Knotweed
Originally uploaded by urtica.

The Giant and Japanese knotweed were running rampant in Seattle when I was there back in 2004.

Dog Days of Winter

Before all the snow is gone here in Massachusetts, I wanted to post this photo of my friend's weimaraner, Sophie, tearing apart a stand of Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica) in her yard. And I didn't even have to ask her to do it :-).

Knotweed and Tulips

I like this photo because of the contrast between the tulip (Tulipa sp.), cultivated for centuries and very well-behaved, and Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica), cultivated for over a century but very unruly indeed. You could try to give it a "time out" in the corner but you know it wouldn't stay there :-). Photo was taken at the UMass Boston greenhouses...by now the tulips have shed their petals and the knotweed has long since shaded them out anyway.

Stalking the Wild Knotweed

This past week I was in Washington state, and had the opportunity to go out knotweed hunting in Seattle with freelance botanist Peter Zika (Thanks Peter!). There seem to be many more hybrid stands (Fallopia x bohemica) - obvious crosses between Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica) and giant knotweed (Fallopia sachalinense) - in Seattle than in Massachusetts. It was also easier to find the spectacularly-leaved giant knotweed there (pictured below), though both it and Japanese knotweed were nowhere near as common as their hybrid offspring.